“Has your brother, the marquess, ever seen it, so he could admire that fact?”
“Once, soon after I bought it twenty odd years ago.”
Twenty years ago. It had been purchased with those jewels and gold. Tyndale was goading him by letting him know that they now played the final hand in a game begun long ago. A hand that Tyndale expected to win, as he had all the others. Daniel swallowed the fury and memories that wanted to rise in response to the reference.
“You do realize that others know I have come here.”
“Your wife’s letter said nothing of this estate. You could have gone anywhere in Kent.”
“Others were present when I received the letter. They know I came looking for you.”
“You came here, but did not find me—that will be the story the servants give. I was not here, nor was Diane. You left, and looked elsewhere.”
“Margot knows that you took Diane.”
“The word of a courtesan, and one kept by a merchant at that, will have no weight. As it happens I am spending today and the next several days with an old friend, who will swear I was with him the whole time. The Earl of Glasbury. He owes me the favor. As for your wife, she ran away from you, you forced her to return, and she ran away again.” Tyndale paced as he spoke, until he forced himself into Daniel’s view. “Did you think that I would forget to see to such things? I am insulted.”
Daniel was glad that he was, for the simple reason that it had him alluding to his plans and intentions. Thus far, the revelations had not been encouraging. Diane might be safe now, but if Tyndale intended murder he could not leave her alive as a witness.
He regretted demanding to see her. It could have forced Tyndale’s hand with her. If she remained ignorant . . . From the corner of his eye he noticed Tyndale studying him. No hand had been forced. Tyndale had decided how he would do this from the start.
“I would have my curiosity satisfied on one point,” Tyndale said. “Who the hell are you?”
“I am the son of your past and the witness to your sins.”
“Spare me the bad poetry. Who are you? You knew what was in the library, but I remember no child in that family.”
Daniel had dreamed of the day when he would let this man know who had brought him down. He had lived for the moment when Tyndale’s nose would be forced into the hell his own actions had wrought. Now, suddenly, it did not matter.
Let Tyndale wonder. Let him worry. Let him always wait, lest another son of the past arrive.
“My father had been given liberty to use the library and had commented in my presence on its owner’s experiments. Scientists enjoy discussing their theories to any who will listen. Dupré can explain that to you. After all, he knew that an important mathematical proof would be found in those papers and notes.”
Tyndale’s lids lowered. “You could not have been more than a boy at the time. What would you understand about proofs and theories of electricity?”
“What I did not know or understand, others have explained. Not everyone who waited on that coast died. Not every person you betrayed was executed. I am not the only one who remembers what you did. Kill me, but you will not kill the past. The war protected you, but that is long over now. Others will come for you now that they can.”
Tyndale’s expression both fell and hardened. Daniel saw a speck of doubt join the uglier lights in his eyes.
A commotion in the hall drew their attention. The door opened and Diane walked in. Before an arm pulled the door closed, Daniel caught sight of one very worried French scientist and of another man with a beard, probably one of Tyndale’s servants.
Diane walked over to Daniel and gave him a light kiss. Her eyes met his with a wonderful expression of warmth and love, but she also conveyed a message of caution in that brief look.
She turned to Tyndale. “I trust that you will not return me to that crude, musty cottage.”
“You will stay here. The servants have been dealt with, so I do not need to hide you any longer.”
“I do not understand why you ever did. If you merely desired a meeting with my husband, you could have called on him as other men do.”
“I do not call on such as your husband. I call for them.” He turned a sly smile on Daniel. “You never told her, did you?”
“Told me what?”
“Your husband is a swindler, my dear. Also a fraud and a cheat. He is an imposter, taking names as they suit him, seducing his way into fine circles so he can rob people with his schemes. Did he find you in some alley and pay you to help him? I doubt that he is your cousin, you see, so I have a passing curiosity about your relationship to him.”
The string of insults had Diane’s expression hardening.
“Do not allow your pique at losing her make you a fool,” Daniel said. “Insult her further, and you will get nothing from me.”
“I will get everything I want from you,” Tyndale snarled. “Everything you have, including her if I choose.” He closed his eyes, and forced the spurt of fury down. “Of course, you had to go and ruin her, so she is of no interest to me anymore. Unless you refuse to do as I say. Then I’ll be forced to shoot her in the head.”
Diane tried to show Tyndale no fear, but Daniel saw that the threat stunned her.
He slid his arm around her protectively. “You have a chamber prepared for her, I assume. Let her go there now so that you and I can complete our conversation.”
“Of course. My man will show you the way. My apologies for the lack of a woman to assist you, but they can never be trusted. Oh, and the locks—well, it is important that you not leave just yet, so do not bother trying to open the door.”
Diane turned her back on Tyndale. She looked up at Daniel.
Nothing could be said with Tyndale watching. Diane’s face was not visible to their captor, but Daniel knew his was, and he dared not reveal the pain burning his heart. For all he knew, this would be his last sight of her. He should be telling her things, speaking words not spoken yet and begging forgiveness for endangering her, but that was denied him. He could only gaze into her moist, expressive eyes and trust that she understood all of it.
A small, wavering smile formed despite her tears. She rose on her toes to kiss him. Her whisper barely sounded, but it reached his ears anyway.
“I know that you love me,” she said.
Diane did not undress. She had no intention of remaining the night in the chamber where they had locked her.
She strained to hear sounds that would tell her what was happening. Surely if a pistol fired the sound would reach her. With every minute that passed in silence, her belief grew that Daniel would find a way to outsmart Tyndale.
Through her high window, she watched the sliver of moon rise in the sky. She stayed awake as the night slowly slid past, thinking of Daniel. She kept all of her concentration on memories of him, as if her thoughts alone could protect him.
When half the night had passed and she was convinced that she was the only one left awake in the house, a sound outside her door told her that was not true.
She jumped from the window bench and grabbed a heavy candlestick. Tyndale had said she was of no use to him now, but she did not trust the man. He might harm or misuse her merely to torture Daniel.
Keys sounded in the locks. The door eased open. A shadow slipped in.
She began to raise the candlestick, but stopped. Her soul recognized the intruder.
“Come with me,” Jonathan said quietly.
“Where?”
“Gustave is waiting at the cottage with a horse. He will get you away.”
“You must free Daniel too.”
“I cannot do that. Nor do I want to. Neither Gustave nor I wish to see you harmed, however. If you stay, I fear that you will be.”
“Perhaps you will be as well. Free my husband. Let us all leave together. If Tyndale is thinking of murder, neither you nor Gustave will be safe if you know what he has done. You will never be missed. No one even knows that you are still aliv
e.”
“You know it. If you escape, Tyndale will have to reorder his plans, whatever they may be.” He eased the door open again. “More than locks guard your husband. I cannot get to him, even if I wanted to. Now come quickly, before Gustave loses his courage, or decides that between the risk of a noose or facing Tyndale’s wrath, he would prefer the former.”
She joined him at the door, but touched his arm, stopping him. “Why don’t you take me away instead of Gustave? Whoever remains will face the most danger.”
“It must be Gustave. I am a better liar than he is, and stand a better chance when Tyndale begins asking questions.” He covered her hand with his. “As for any danger—allow me to be a father this once. Finally.”
His skin felt rough on hers, and moist in a way that revealed his bravery had not come easily. He was afraid. She pictured him these last hours, weighing her against everything else, knowing he should not respond to that primal connection they had, but succumbing to the demands of fatherly duty all the same.
She embraced him in gratitude for the hard choice he had made. “Do not lie too well,” she said. “Let Tyndale think that I am going for help. Let him know that I will tell everyone what I saw here.”
“The idiot.”
Andrew could not believe he had been cursed with such a fool as Gustave Dupré.
The irony was unbearable. The man was a scientist, but he proved incapable of rational judgment. The absence this morning of both Gustave and Diane proved that.
The little man had helped her to escape.
“Whatever she says will implicate him,” he said. “He is riding to his own hanging. Is the man too stupid to see that?”
Jonathan shrugged. “I think he fell in love with her. He kept calling her a little sparrow yesterday. It distressed him that your plans put her in danger.”
“She was in no danger, merely a lure to get her husband here.” Tyndale decided to ignore how thin the lie sounded. If spoken sincerely enough, and he now spoke most sincerely, lies became truths to the people hungry to hear them.
“You should have explained things better, then. Gustave could not see how you could allow her to leave, knowing her husband had met you here. I was at a loss on how that would work myself and could not help him. Still, I never expected him to be so bold. Well, there wasn’t much moon and Dupré is no horseman. Maybe they fell down a hill and broke their necks.”
Andrew hoped so. He could not count on it, however. Nor did he know just when the two of them had left. With the estate emptied of most servants, no one had seen anything.
His gaze fell on the documents stacked on the corner of his library desk. He had spent hours last night trying to get St. John to sign them. Hours of promises about Diane, and oaths of honor, and arguments and threats. He had played on St. John’s concern for his wife. In offering a path to salvation for the only person who mattered to his prey, he had expected to obtain the signatures. It had worked before. Instead, St. John had remained adamant that he would sign nothing until Diane was released.
He would not have held to that if a pistol were aimed at her heart. Which it would have been this morning, Tyndale had decided.
And now Gustave had run off with the girl, complicating everything.
Well, if it had to be a duel, so be it. It wasn’t as if St. John would win.
“Will you let him go too?” Jonathan asked.
“And spend the rest of my life looking over my shoulder? I will handle this a different way, that is all. Bring him these documents. Tell him she is gone, and if he signs them we will meet with honor to settle things.”
The door to Daniel’s chamber opened. The bearded servant he had seen in the corridor yesterday entered. He carried the documents from the night before.
“Tyndale wants to meet with you,” he said.
“Until I have proof my wife is safe, he and I have nothing to discuss.”
“As it happens, your wife is gone. She left during the night. He does not want to discuss anything. He wants to meet.”
The news surprised Daniel. He refused to believe it even though profound relief shook through him. It would be just like Tyndale to lie about this, to get those deeds signed. No sooner than the ink was dried it would turn out to be a ruse.
As he forcibly controlled the vain hope that she was actually gone, he saw a small smile form above the man’s beard.
He inspected the man more closely. “Do I know you?”
“Why do you ask? Do I appear familiar?”
He did, in vague ways.
“I am an old friend of Tyndale’s, and an old victim of yours, St. John. Or should I say St. Clair?”
St. Clair. Daniel suddenly saw this man in the lamps of a Parisian street, lunging with a knife. He saw him again, slipping away on a Southwark alley. Finally, with total clarity, he saw him without the beard and sickly pallor, smiling with confidence over a hand of cards.
He watched the man’s eyes. He knew them very well because he had seen them often, recently, on another face.
“Did you get her away?” he asked, as the hope began rising again.
“Yes.”
“Then you realized who she is.”
“She recognized me. Can you believe that? I only saw her a few times a year when she was a child, but she recognized me.”
“She kept the image of you alive when all other memories deserted her.”
Jonathan nodded. “Well, she is gone, and out of this.”
“I thank you.”
“I did not do it for you. As far as I care, Tyndale can cut you into pieces. Still, it will not be murder and that is just as well. Whatever plan he had hatched, I suspect that Gustave and I would have been surprised by the parts concerning us. Now he must deal with you honorably.” He dropped the documents on the bed. “If you sign these, that is how it will be.”
Daniel did not expect this duel to be honorable at all. The witnesses would all be Tyndale’s. Still, it was a chance, which was more than he had expected.
He pulled on his coat. “You are sure that she is away? That she is safe?”
“As her father, I swear to you the truth of that.”
The relief had its way this time. It flooded him, washing away a night of worry and self-recrimination. Later, if he survived, he would face the latter again, but he could not allow it to distract him now.
He picked up the documents and carried them to a table. Using a quill and ink pot there, he scrawled his name on each one.
“Let us go down. It is time to finish this.”
chapter 27
They waited in the park behind the house as the silver sky lightened. The morning held a mystical quality. But for the chorus of birdcalls, there were no sounds as the earth revealed its beauty. Daniel breathed in the fecund smells and noticed all the details as he never had before.
Peace saturated him along with the new light.
Knowing Diane was safe made all the difference. He would not be distracted by worry for her, at least.
Jonathan walked over from the tree where he had been standing with the three footmen who guarded Daniel. “He should come soon.”
“What will you say when questions are asked? Surely you know that he has no intention of making this fair. Tyndale will make sure that this duel ends only one way.”
“I owe you nothing. Those papers you signed will give me back my life,” Jonathan said. “If you die, I saw a fair duel.”
“What of your daughter? Diane will know the truth. She is aware of all of the strings in this knot of betrayal and revenge that we have tied.”
“I lost her long ago. I have no dreams about that.”
A door opened up at the house. The dot of a blond head appeared and moved toward them. Two other men walked alongside. As they neared, Daniel saw the box of pistols he had brought from Hampstead in one man’s arms. The other carried a silver tray loaded with cups and a coffee urn.
Daniel’s mind flew through a whole life of emotions. He did not see
Tyndale, but harsh images from his boyhood and youth. Anger began to rise in him. Then his thoughts veered to more recent memories, of Diane and her gentle love, and the sweetest, most profound nostalgia and regret flooded him.
He had lived for this moment, for this chance to settle the past with Tyndale. Ruin had been enough for the others, but he had dreamed of killing the man who had been the instigator of that betrayal all those years ago. He had expected it to be hatred that filled him when the time came.
Instead, all that mattered now was the terrible awareness that he might never hold Diane in his arms again.
Sadly, he forced his thoughts away from her. He doubted that he had much chance of surviving today, but he would have none at all if he dwelled on what he might lose.
The sun broke over the trees. Golden light spread on the park, displaying the perfection of Tyndale’s appearance. Daniel struggled to put on the armor of cold concentration that he would need soon.
The sun brought sounds as well as clear light. Nature came alive to join the chorus of chirping birds. Beneath it all, the vague noise of wheels and horses leaked into the air.
That sound got louder with each step that Tyndale took.
Tyndale heard it. He stopped and looked quizzically back at the house.
The sound abruptly stopped. Birds filled the hole it left, so that one wondered if it had ever been there.
Tyndale came forward, his expression as open as ever. He gestured for his man. “Coffee?”
Daniel looked past the tray and over the shoulder of the man who carried it. A movement had caught his eye. A figure appeared on the side of the house, then disappeared.
Tyndale’s gaze followed Daniel’s up to the house. “It appears we have a guest.” A sour note punctuated his tone.
“That would be my second,” Daniel said. “The Chevalier Corbet.”
Tyndale set down his cup on the tray. “It appears they did not fall and break their necks, Jonathan. Nor did Gustave have the sense to keep her in confinement.”
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